A good night for plain gammon.For a salad with it, with rather stronger and more finical tastes, alternated slices of tomato and onion in a lemon and dill vinaigrette, topped with Stilton crumbles.

*****I’ve a feeling – only that, which is, frankly, as true for the Met Office, really – that this may be a wintry winter.I suggest getting your firing now.Mind, that may be what I rather hope than know, as I like the seasons to be bloody seasonal, not some semi-tropical stasis of enervation.

*****Oh – and I don’t care what the quangocrats and local councils say, my pudding was not renamed ‘Spotted Richard’, damn it all.*****

Overheard two local solicitors recently.

‘You know that clause will mean nothing to them.’

‘Yes, but it sounds well.It adds a sense of verisimilitude –’

‘– To an otherwise bald and unconvincing settlement?Really, Charles.My draughtsmanship’s not all that poor.’

On the one hand, I’m glad to see that G&S live.On the other, one can see why lawyers are so despised.

New Scientist informs me that most of the world's climate may be having an unusually cold patch for the next couple of years. Even Sydney had a few actually cold days this past winter. Alas, the same climatologists predict a hellish summer for me, and they have been on the money for some time now, on the whole.